


A Twist of Fate

by ASongofIceandHope



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Little bit of smut, Magic Time Travel, Merlin and Morgana - Freeform, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-20
Updated: 2017-06-20
Packaged: 2018-11-16 10:35:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11251365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ASongofIceandHope/pseuds/ASongofIceandHope
Summary: Hermione wakes up in a stranger's bed, and finds herself to be an important part of his life.Funny the things a simple ring can do.





	A Twist of Fate

**Author's Note:**

> So I wrote a little drabble following Tom and Hermione after they get affected by a little old old old magic... I hope you all enjoy!

_Friday, 31 October, 1947_

When he comes back to his private quarters it's the first time he sees her. Tom Riddle doesn't know how she got into his room, considering the difficult and powerful wards he placed on his door, but she was sleeping peacefully, wild curls splayed across his pillowcase. 

Still, he's always been a cautious person and he's quick to examine her.

She's looks maybe a year or so younger than himself, making her around eighteen or nineteen. He wonders at first if she might have been a student who had gotten lost on her way back from a drunken Samhain celebration. The Gryffindors were notorious for such behavior. And there was something about her that seemed… stupidly brave, like the rest of that house. 

Even more curious is the delicate band of gold on her finger. It's dainty, with two pearls set in it and inlaid with diamonds. It looks ancient, but it still sparkles beautifully. 

Tom knows he's read about a ring matching its appearance, and turns to his vast collection of books that he keeps in his room to start consulting them. He could always go to the library, but he knew that his personal collection of books would have more information on magical artifacts than the Hogwarts library. It's as he's consulting his books that the girl wakes, the dark grey bedcovers falling away from her to reveal a simple silk shift of a nightgown. It was burgundy, which only confirmed his suspicions that she was a Gryffindor. But it forced him to reject his theory that she had been drunk at a party and somehow managed to get into his room.

“Mm…” she rubbed her eyes and stretched slowly. “Ron…? Harry…?” she looked around and her face scrunched in alarm. 

“There's no Harry or Ron here,” Tom stated, turning toward her. She scrambled out of the bed, apparently unaware of how exposed she was. He barely had a moment to take in her long, slender legs before remembering the task at hand. “Who are you? How did you get here?”

“I could ask you the same,” she retorted. 

“You answer first, as you seem to be without a wand,” Tom pointed his own wand at her and backed her into a corner, up against another bookshelf. 

“My name is… Hermione. Hermione Granger,” she said softly. “I'm… I’m not completely sure what I'm doing here or how I got here. One minute I was going to bed on Samhain in 1998 with my boyfriend and the next… I'm here. Which leads to my answers being repaid with your own answers.” Tom watched as she pulled her wand out from a simple holster strapped to her thigh that he’d failed to notice earlier. 

“So you are a witch, then,” he raised a brow. 

“Some have called me the brightest witch of my age.” Hermione’s gaze flitted around the room. The surroundings were vaguely familiar; she had a feeling she was somewhere in Hogwarts, and since the room was a single room, it must have been a professor’s quarters. “Are you… a professor?” Tom smirked.

“The youngest professor ever hired to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts,” he boasted. 

Hermione knew she didn't remember reading anything about an extremely young Defence professor in Hogwarts: A History so she was suspicious about what he was telling her. 

“Prove it.”

Tom picked up a copy of the very same book Hermione had been thinking of and handed it to her. She flipped it open to a list of professors, expecting the book to be the same as it was in her own time. Instead, in firm black ink, the name Tom Marvolo Riddle was penned as the current Defence Against the Dark Arts professor, beginning in…

“1947?!” Hermione shrieked. “It's 1947?”

And that wasn't her only problem. She was trapped, alone, with none other than a younger version of Lord Voldemort. He wasn't supposed to have gotten the job as Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher; in her time… timeline, perhaps… Headmaster Armando Dippet had rejected him, citing his age as an issue. However, age didn't seem to be an issue this time around for Riddle to be hired. 

“Yes,” he cocked his head to the side. “Of course it's 1947. It's All Hallow’s Eve, 1947. I understand that's not what you were hoping.” His gaze flitted back to the ring and pointed his wand at it. “Where did you get that?” Hermione looked down at the ring and frowned.

“It was a gift from my boyfriend…” Hermione trailed off. She cursed internally almost immediately. Leave it to Malfoy…

“Well, I’d say he gave you something that he didn't realize what it was,” Tom hummed as a book levitated over to him. He flipped through it until he found the page he had been looking for earlier. “‘The twin pearls of Morgana’ are an ancient source of power for any witch or wizard who wears them. Legend has it that the wearer, if in an unhappy union like Morgana to King Urien, will be taken across whatever distance must be traveled in order to find…” he trailed off.

Hermione, who was well-versed in both muggle and wizarding accounts of Arthurian lore, gasped and backed away from him.

“Accolon? Or… Merlin would perhaps be a better fit, considering,” she snorted. 

Tom presented the book to her and Hermione read it for herself. The pearls represented Merlin and Morgana, two of the most powerful magical individuals to ever walk the face of the earth. Their joining on the ring represented the eternal nature of their power, and if the person wearing the ring did have an unhappy union, the ring would take the wearer to an individual whose power and intelligence suited them better. That, at least, made some sense. The only reason she had hooked up with Malfoy a few months ago was because she was feeling lonely while Ron was off doing some sort of Auror thing, and then she just… stayed. No rhyme or reason. 

“I'll be damned,” she muttered. “So that means you're my equal.”

“Apparently so,” Tom noted. “Which I find rather shocking. However… I will look into this situation and see if your time-jump can't be fixed. In the meantime… we need to find you something a little… more.” He looked her over and Hermione blushed. 

“Very well,” she sighed. “But I will help you to find a way to send me back. I don't want you trying to lie to me for the sake of finding information.”

“I can take whatever I want,” Tom reminded as he stepped out of the room, handing her his teaching robe to cover herself until he could find something better. “Keep that in mind.”

*****

Once she was settled—and dressed like a “proper lady,” Tom said—Hermione and Tom began to think of ways to keep up pretenses between the two of them. Hermione’s first suggestion was that she was a distant cousin on his father’s side who was a muggleborn. He'd seen the marks on her arm that had proclaimed her as such, but he stated that he didn't rightly care. Tom had then cast a strange form of healing spell that had faded the marks to a point that if you didn’t know they were there you would never see them. (She didn't tell him that one of his followers had put them there.)

“No, no,” he’d said. “That won't work.” 

Then he proposed his idea. She would pose as his fiancée. Hermione would be a young woman from France whom Tom had met on his journeys through the continent. They would explain that she had just arrived in Hogsmeade that evening and had joined him in the castle.

“How can I be your fiancée? I don't even have a—“ her gaze flitted down to the pearl ring on her finger. Tom’s eyes fixed on it too and he smirked. “It's on the wrong hand.”

“Let me fix that for you, then,” he murmured, taking it off and switching it to her left ring finger. 

As soon as he did, a band of gold appeared on his own left ring finger and Hermione shrieked. Tom’s expression turned from playful and sly to confused for a second, before becoming icy. He examined his hand, and twisted the ring. It had ancient runes all around it, along with a few diamonds that matched Hermione’s ring.

“It's.. dainty,” he grumbled. Hermione bit back a laugh.

“It suits your pretty hands,” she teased. Then she could have hit herself for teasing the Dark Lord of all people. “I… I didn't mean it like that, of course…” Tom was about to retort when there was a knock on the door.

He rose to his feet and opened it, and Hermione was shocked to see a younger version of Albus Dumbledore standing outside the room. The man peered over his shoulder to get a look at Hermione, who rose to her feet and smoothed the plain black skirt that Tom had acquired for her. “Who is your… friend, Tom?” he inquired. She watched as Tom pasted on a true politician’s grin—it didn't reach his eyes—and motioned for her to come forward. 

“Professor Dumbledore, if I may introduce my fiancée, Hermione Granger. Hermione, this is Professor—“

“Albus Dumbledore,” Hermione finished. “I have heard so much about you. The continent will be forever in your debt for your defeat of Gellert Grindelwald. It was very difficult, attending Beauxbatons all those years with the threat of a dark wizard on the rise.” She could see the look of suspicion on Dumbledore’s face; no doubt he was wondering why a girl from Beauxbatons was engaged to an aspiring Dark Lord. “Tom… he was very good to me while he was visiting the continent before taking his job here. I had lost my parents while at school, and when I finished… I had no one. I was living all alone in Paris, until I met Tom one night when I let my friends drag me out for a drink,” she giggled slightly, “and the rest… is history, as they say.” Tom grinned and wrapped an arm around her waist.

“Funny, I dare say he's never mentioned you,” Dumbledore fixed his gaze on her. “Though he can be a bit secretive, our Tom. Regardless, welcome to Hogwarts.”

“Thank you so much, professor,” Hermione smiled. She placed a hand on Tom’s chest, trying not to cringe. 

*****

_31 December, 1947_

“It’s my birthday, you know,” Tom informed one morning during winter break as he got dressed. He had taken Hermione back to London for the holiday; with his professor’s salary he had managed to rent a decent flat in a nice part of wizarding London. To keep up appearances, they shared a bed, but nothing had happened between the two of them. Hermione wondered if Tom Riddle felt anything for anyone at all; she somewhat doubted it.

“Oh?” she was sitting on their bed, still in her pajamas, reading a volume about Merlin and Morgana. “And what do you want to do for your… twenty-first birthday?”

Tom shrugged. “I don't know. Never celebrated it much.”

Hermione’s heart went out for him in that moment; he'd been an orphan, same as Harry, and both of them had miserable upbringings. And she was learning that the Tom Riddle of 1947, while devious and clearly interested in the Dark Arts, was not the same man as the Voldemort of her time. 

“We could,” she offered. “There's nothing stopping us from having a lovely evening. It's New Year’s Eve, after all.” Her gaze flitted to a dinner party invitation from Abraxas Malfoy—Draco’s grandfather—and she grinned. Putting down her book, she got to her feet and plucked it off his dresser. “We could go to Malfoy’s party. I'm sure it's to be a ridiculously… high-class affair.” Tom rolled his eyes and finished fixing his tie. He was going to Diagon Alley, which Hermione knew meant he was going to Knockturn Alley instead. 

“And what if I wanted to stay here, with a bottle of champagne, and ring in the year quietly?” he asked, gently wrapping his arms around her waist. His touch was jarring, even when light. Hermione wondered if it had to do with the rings, which they soon had learned were twin rings—Tom’s was Merlin’s, and the thirteen diamonds inlaid in it represented Arthur and the twelve Knights of the Round Table. It would appear when Morgana’s ring was placed on a witch’s finger by the wizard in question. It also confirmed that they were… bonded, in a way. Two halves of a whole, or two sides of a coin. 

“Whatever makes this a wonderful birthday for you,” she promised. He grinned his politician grin and started to lean down to kiss her, only for Hermione to feel his hands flex as he pulled away.

“I'll be back later,” he told her. And without another word, he walked out the door.

_Midnight, 1 January, 1948_

She had never been kissed on midnight of New Year’s Eve. 

Or at least, she hadn't, until she met Tom Riddle. They'd killed a bottle of champagne together and Tom counted down the seconds on his wristwatch before turning to her and kissing her hard on the lips. Her whole body felt like it was on fire, but not in a bad way. Her arms wrapped around his neck, and she moaned when his tongue slipped into her mouth. 

And she began to doubt her belief that Voldemort had to have died without ever touching a girl.

The scramble over to the bed was a mess; articles of clothing were literally flying off of them as Hermione wrapped her legs around his hips and he carried her back over to the mattress. He laid her down with an unceremonious flop, and she laughed. 

“How romantic,” she teased, her slightly intoxicated gaze flitting over his form. He’d shed his jacket and his sweater, and Hermione was transfixed as his long, slender fingers made quick work of his belt. She was already down to her brassiere and knickers, and reached down to rub herself through the silky material of her panties. Tom’s jaw went slack and he was fairly certain that some part of his brain short-circuited at the sight. A low growl bloomed in his chest as he worked his shirt off, leaving his trousers on as he climbed on top of her.

“Wet for me already, my little witch?” he purred as slipped a hand inside her knickers to rub at her folds. She was slick and warm to the touch, and his cock strained eagerly against his zipper. Hermione panted and squirmed beneath him, squeezing her own breasts as he worked his pants off with a bit of magic while he fingered her.

“Tom…” she sighed, her eyes lighting up in delight at the sight of his cock. 

He didn't hesitate to sheathe himself inside of her as soon as her knickers were gone. Hermione gasped, arching up beneath him to meet his hips with her own. She had slept with Draco, and he had been a good, tentative lover, but he had never filled her the way Tom was filling her that instant. 

“Move… now… please…” she whined, wiggling beneath him. Tom obliged her, starting with laboriously slow thrusts that made Hermione moan softly in his ear. She wrapped a leg around his hips, her heel digging into his lower back, urging him on.

With a grunt, Tom picked up his pace—partly because he wasn't sure how long he was going to last, and also because he wanted to see if he could make her scream. 

And scream she did. Hermione saw stars when her orgasm wracked over her body in waves. Tom himself groaned at how she tightened around his length, forcing him to spill inside of her. He didn't regret it. If the ancient magic in their rings had bound them together… well, perhaps there was no point in resisting the draw to each other. 

“Was this… a good birthday present?” Hermione asked as soon as she could catch her breath.

“The best I've ever received,” he murmured.

*****

_17 May, 1948_

The bump was undeniable. Hermione stared at it every morning in shock, protruding ever so slightly from beneath their bedcovers. And the baby was starting to move, which made Hermione even more frightened. 

Tom, however, was perfectly calm. He was succeeding in his teaching position, and they had married just in March. On the Ides of March, ironically. 

She'd learned things about him since their marriage that made him seem even more human than before. He loved chocolates. And coffee. Tom could quote Shakespeare freely, and recite all of Hamlet’s major soliloquies by heart. He was brilliant with numbers, and spoke French and German—all self-taught. He was a genius in the muggle sense of the word just as much as he was in the wizarding sense. 

“What about Ophelia, if it's a girl?” he suggested one morning as he prepared to go to class. It was an unusual arrangement for Hermione to be staying with him at Hogwarts, but Dippet had allowed it quite willingly.

“I'm not naming our child after a suicidal twit,” Hermione rolled her eyes. 

“Then what should we call our child if we have a daughter?” he raised a brow. Hermione sat up and plucked one of her favorite books from the nightstand. 

“I want to call her Jane,” she said. “And if it's a boy… Arthur. Or Darcy.” 

“Merlin, you and your muggle novels—“

“You and your muggle playwrights!” Hermione retorted, throwing his copy of Marlowe’s _Doctor Faustus_ at him. “Might want to take notes of where Faustus goes wrong, dear.” Tom rolled his eyes and set the book back down.

“A compromise? Ophelia for a daughter, and Darcy for a son.”

“Very well.”

*****

_10 October, 1948_

All of Hogwarts—especially the female population—was all aflutter over the arrival of Professor Riddle’s newborn son. Darcy Taran Riddle was tiny, weighing a little more than six pounds, but he already had every woman in the school wrapped around his little fingers. Hermione found that labor had been fairly easy, though painful, but the school’s matron had proved extremely competent during the delivery. 

Tom had a full day of classes the day Darcy arrived, and Hermione made him promise to do his duty to his students first. He arrived in the evening, skipping supper, and arrived just in time to see his son placed in his mother’s arms.

“You're a handsome little fellow, aren't you?” Hermione cooed to the sleeping infant. 

The newborn already had lots of hair; wisps upon wisps of his father’s inky locks. When his eyes opened a crack, they were a deep, dark blue that the matron predicted would change eventually. Tom sat in a chair beside Hermione’s bed, watching her and the baby silently. 

“Say hello to daddy, Darcy,” she mumbled, lifting him up a bit so Tom could see him better. 

“He… He’s perfect, Hermione,” Tom stated. “You're perfect.” Hermione blushed; with Tom, being praised as perfect was as close as you could get to having him say “I love you” or “you're beautiful.” He valued perfection above all else, so it was the highest compliment one could receive from him. 

Headmaster Dippet and the staff all came in to congratulate the young couple, and Hermione heard in whispered tones that Darcy’s name was already on the list to receive a Hogwarts letter when the time came. 

Everything truly was… perfect.

*****

_9 September, 1949_

Until… everything wasn't. 

Tom was eternally on edge, and she knew that he was itching to delve into the Dark Arts that he loved so much. He started to blame her for keeping him from his pursuits, and their relationship turned colder and colder as Darcy’s first birthday approached rapidly. 

“Why don't you just go, then?!” she screamed at him one evening through the floo connection between their new home and his chambers at Hogwarts. “Why don't you just run off to… to Bulgaria or wherever it is you want to go? Go off burning things and killing muggleborns like you and your little Knights or whatever the bloody hell you call them like to do! Have I not told you enough about the future, Tom? Have you not learned—“

“Hermione—“

“I hope you just think about when you kill those deplorables that you realize that you're killing people like me! People like your SON, Tom! Or did that never matter? Did we never matter? Was this all just a game—“

“Hermione, PLEASE!” Tom seethed. She was in tears by then, furiously wiping them from her cheeks. “You won't let me get a word in!”

“Well maybe it's for a reason,” she sniffled. “Maybe I'm scared, Tom. Scared of what you could become, scared of myself… I… I'm pregnant again, Tom.” He was silent for so long that she was afraid he'd cut the connection. 

“I'm coming home now,” was all he said.

*****

_25 October, 1951_

She stood off to the side, holding little Darcy’s hand and baby Arthur in her other arm as their father shook hands with the departing Minister for Magic. It had taken him all of two years to build himself a political career, and Tom had done it with such style and ease the likes of which wouldn't be seen again until the United States muggle presidential elections of 1960. Hermione, however, had been the silent force behind Tom’s rise. After months of fighting, he had confessed his boredom with his position at Hogwarts, and she encouraged him to put his skills to use elsewhere. 

And he was a natural. 

He knew how to shake all the right hands and speak to all the right people. Tom Riddle was a born politician. And Hermione believed that she had finally steered him in the right direction.

“Mummy, I go see daddy?” Darcy asked with big hazel eyes shining.

“In a minute, love,” she released his hand and brushed back his hair from his forehead. He pouted beside her and Arthur squirmed to be let down so he could toddle about. Hermione listened as intently as she could to Tom’s speech; it was progressive and youthful and full of hope—just the kind of message the wizarding world needed. When he finished, the crowds cheered as he made his way over to his wife and children, picking up Darcy who threw his arms around his father’s neck lovingly. 

“Let's head home,” he whispered to Hermione before kissing her cheek. 

When they returned to their new home, a posh London townhouse, Hermione sat twisting her ring slightly. She often wondered what would happen if she took it off longer than a few seconds. She'd never tried. When she tugged at it, however, it didn't budge and it burned her fingers slightly when she did try to remove it. 

She had to accept it. Her fate was intertwined with Tom Riddle’s, just as Morgana’s had been intertwined with Merlin’s. 

It was… fate.

**Author's Note:**

> So there's the Drabble! Not a lot of angst, but I do like the magic aspect of the two rings.  
> Don't forget to drop a comment or a kudos!


End file.
